On Wednesday, during a discussion at the Code Conference, Hillary Clinton, the former presidential candidate, dismissed the investigation of her private email server as being insignificant.
“The use of my email account was turned into, you know, the biggest scandal since Lord knows when,” Clinton said when the topic of “weaponizing” technology came up in the conversation. “And, you know … I’m just using everything that anybody else said about it besides me to basically say this was the biggest nothing-burger ever.”
Clinton continued, “It was a mistake. I’ve said it was a mistake. And obviously, if I could turn the clock back, I wouldn’t have done it in the first place. But the way that it was used was very damaging.”
The executive producer of the conference, Kara Swisher, from Recode, then asked Clinton, “And you didn’t handle it — that’s a mistake on your part, or the way it was used was a mistake on your — because we’re trying to get at what you think you misjudged?”
Clinton replied, reiterating her previous stance that she wasn’t careless and didn’t break any rules.
“Doing something that others had done before was no longer acceptable in the new environment in which we found ourselves,” Clinton explained to Swisher. “And there was no law against it; there was no rule — nothing of that sort. So, I didn’t break any rule. Nobody said, don’t do this — and I was very responsible and not at all careless.”
Later during the discussion, Clinton went on to compare the coverage her email scandal received to the US’ role in the World War 2 and how Pearl Harbor was covered by the media.
“And I think it was interesting — I know you had Dean Baquet here from The New York Times yesterday. And they covered it like it was Pearl Harbor,” Clinton said. “And then, in their endorsement of me, they said, this email thing — it’s like a help desk issue. So, it was always a hard issue to put to bed; but we put it to bed in July. And then, it rose up again.”
